


Armistice

by HyfrydCymru (a_haunting_of_four)



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: (implied) - Freeform, 1917, Blood and Injury, Character Study, Established Relationship, Hidden Depths, Hope vs. Despair, M/M, Some Humor, Temporary Character Death, can be read as slash or gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-24
Updated: 2020-12-24
Packaged: 2021-03-10 20:40:57
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,287
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28273266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_haunting_of_four/pseuds/HyfrydCymru
Summary: There is very little humour in Prussia’s face, and a lot of ice in his eyes despite the smirk he’s sporting. He drops Arthur’s leg without much care. Arthur feels the dull impact reverberate up his knee and hip. His toe twitches as the heel of his sock starts soaking up the moisture from the ground.“I pulled you off a wagon.” Gilbert shares, unprompted. “You’re welcome.”-A quiet interlude between nations on opposite sides of the war.
Relationships: England & France (Hetalia), England & Prussia (Hetalia), England/France (Hetalia)
Comments: 3
Kudos: 28





	Armistice

He wakes to solid ground underneath his back and his body being jostled. It is a muted feeling, registering oddly across his entire body where it lays stiff and unresponsive. Alarmingly numb. So much so that it takes him another moment to realise that it is his leg being pulled; that it is half raised off the ground. Firm tugs, and upwards pressure, scraping uncomfortably against his ankle and heel.

His boot. Someone is tugging off his boot.

Arthur realises he must have been holding his breath, and he wheezes roughly, trying to gasp enough air. It’s too much too soon and he exhales in a cut off cough that _hurts_.

The tugging stops.

His eyes feel dry, gritty, and he can only open them halfway. It’s enough.

Prussia is still holding his foot, one hand holding the heel, the other tangled in the bootlaces. He is uncharacteristically solemn, expression impassive where he is looking down at him. It quickly melts into a razor sharp grin.

“Sleep well, schatzi?” He pats the front of his foot amiably.

Even with a head full of cotton and the sharp pain behind his eyes, things are starting to become a little clearer. Trying to open his left eye pulls on the skin around the bridge of his nose, and his upper lip when he shifts his jaw. The back of his head feels wet.

He wonders if he was shot or if it was shrapnel that got him.

It takes him a few tries to be able to speak.

“Did you shoot me for the boots?”

Arthur hates how weak his voice is. So rough he can hardly make out his own words. Trying to swallow does nothing to ease the gravel scratching at his throat. His mouth is unbearably dry.

Gilbert shrugs and continues working on his boot. Apparently giving up on undoing the knot he has made some progress in just tugging the interlacing loose enough that he’ll be able to slip his foot out.

“Would you rather I shot one of your boys instead?” He sounds tauntingly disaffected by the prospect.

“Fuck you.” The words come out heated and harsh, and perfectly clear. His chest heaves with the effort.

There is very little humour in Prussia’s face, and a lot of ice in his eyes despite the smirk he’s sporting. He drops Arthur’s leg without much care. 

Arthur feels the dull impact reverberate up his knee and hip. His toe twitches as the heel of his sock starts soaking up the moisture from the ground.

“I pulled you off a wagon.” Gilbert shares, unprompted. “You’re welcome.”

He pulls Arthur’s other foot onto his lap and the process starts again.

Keeping his breathing steady is hard enough. Arthur won’t waste any more of it talking. He consciously relaxes his neck and lets himself blink, half-blind, at the sky.

It must be early in the morning still, the gaps between branches a pale blue-grey. He does not remember trees. Just an open field and a village some kilometres away. A chapel over the hill.

Then darkness. Pressure pushing down on his chest. Gilbert stealing his shoes.

The breeze blowing through the canopy above is a mild thing. It barely shifts the leaves. Three years of a war built on centuries of violence and it still shocks him. For all that time seems set on tearing them apart there will always be this. Land removed from conflict. Clear skies unobstructed by smoke or ash.

The smell of blood is starting to register more strongly. Rusted iron and sickly sweet rot. The stiffness of his face might very well be because he’s drenched in it.

I pulled you off a wagon, Gilbert said. His heart pounds sluggishly in his chest.

Darkness. Pressure. Something digging into his back. Another man’s hand brushing against his own, cold and stiff.

He feels ill. Chokes on the nausea.

Gilbert must have dug him out from underneath a pile of corpses.

His body is starting to feel cold, and Arthur can feel the beginnings of a shiver forming from the bottom of his spine. His jaw shudders. His body is so cold and he cannot move.

“Who ties your god damned laces?” The frustration in Gilbert’s voice brings him back to the present. The way he tugs on the cross-lacing is almost deliberately consistent. Arthur tries to match his breathing with every draw, and it works to a point. Keeps him from losing himself to the pins and needles in his arms and the horror and grief caught in his throat.

He can move his neck marginally so he shifts his head lightly, side to side, to test how much it hurts. His left eye is starting to twitch, blood dissolving as his eyes water. It stings, but with every blink his vision is clearer.

When Gilbert finally gets his boot loose and drops his leg this time it hurts.

“Come on now. You’re fine.” Gilbert pats him on the knee condescendingly and England grits is teeth to keep from wincing. “There’s a good man.”

The shivers are getting worse as the numbness disperses from his shoulders and thighs. He feels colder with every twitch.

Gilbert is talking to himself. Or at him. Arthur cannot focus much on his words. There is a high pitched ringing in his right ear, on and off.

“There we go! So much better.” 

Gilbert stands and makes a show of getting a good feel of his new boots. Turns his ankles and stomps like he is trying to mould the sole around his feet.

The whole thing is frankly absurd enough that Arthur can’t help rolling his eyes. Blast the pain.

He doesn’t let himself think of how Gilbert’s mannerisms have always reminded him of Ireland. Lanky limbs and a crooked smile. A dark sense of humour to match the occasion. Last he heard he was stationed in the base hospital at St Omer. His brother, the Red Cross Volunteer.

He will get Arthur’s tags and a death notice from Prussia’s regiment in a few weeks, or a few months, if Gilbert wasn’t thorough. His personal belongings and one set of tags sent to Geneva, then redirected to his next-of-kin. They would have checked him for them before piling him on. Taken his personal belongings. Except…

Arthur realises that he is drifting away when Gilbert’s old boots land with a thud to his left. One of them is close enough to where his hand is still uselessly curled into a loose fist that he can feel it brushing the back of his knuckles.

“There are some of yours a few hours out. Southeast. If you get up soon enough you could make it to them before sundown.” Prussia’s voice is deceptively light as he finishes setting himself to right, slinging his gun over his shoulder and tightening the straps of his kit with well-practiced efficiency. “Thank you for the boots.”

Some of the blasé act falls away right as he is about to walk away. 

“Say hello to Francis for me when you see him, won’t you?”

It is as honest as Gilbert ever is. Arthur holds his gaze and nods; hopes the gratitude in his eyes is enough for now.

The corner of Gilbert’s mouth twitches and he is off without a second glance behind. 

Arthur makes the effort to crane his neck enough so he can watch him disappear between the thin line of trees. He has to drop it back down when his head starts pounding again, like the worst of migraines. He can no longer tell whether it is blood or sweat now, but something streams down the back of his neck. His breathing hitches and he wonders whether this is another kindness-- Gilbert walking away and leaving him alone to heave and shake as his body tries to put itself back together. Wonders whether Gilbert can hear his bitten back moans and panting breath as he regains the full use of his lungs.

His entire body aches, and it takes a formidable effort to push past the pain and turn to his side to spit out bile and blood when his stomach cramps. It takes another few dry heaves and swallowing compulsively for it to pass and he gingerly turns himself back.

The leaves above him are still swaying gently in the breeze. Even if he closes his eyes he can tell from the way the shadows bounce behind his closed lids.

Beyond the smell of gunpowder and blood, and the filth of the trenches, there is the scent of roots and wet earth. Gently, he lets his head fall to the side until he can feel the grass graze his cheek. If he could turn even further he could press his ear to the ground. A cheap imitation to pressing his ear against Francis’ chest to listen to the beating of his heart.

He can’t be too far from Serre, although he cannot be sure as long as his mind keeps getting away from him. With some effort he manages to pin down the last night he can remember before his thoughts begin to blur. The layout of the communications trench is clear in his mind’s eyes, as is the face of the man who had kept watch with him through the night. A chap from Leicestershire who looked twice Arthur’s age and treated him as such; who’d had a habit of picking up souvenirs wherever they were stationed. Kept them in a shoe polish tin from a local shop back home.

He had pulled out a flint scraper from it one night and held it close to a match to show Arthur where the tip had chipped away. Bronze age, he had said, speaking from the side of his mouth so he would not drop his pipe. His proudest find. Arthur had let him wax on for the couple of hours of reprieve they had. Listening intently as he explained how the war tearing the continent apart was unearthing old bones.

Harry Ward Taylor from Leicestershire, who fancied himself a historian. Arthur wonders who is wearing his boots now.

He doesn’t realise that he is sobbing shallowly until he feels the tears run down the side of his face, shoulders hitching irregularly.

It is the pain. The grief. Another death. The deep exhaustion settled deep into his oldest foundations. Arthur lets them wash over him silently for a long moment before his tired lungs can’t sustain it.

The fingers of his left hands twitch. Slowly he works regaining control over them, curling and uncurling his fist and gaining an inch back of his range of motion with every repetition. Curl and uncurl, matching the movement to his unsteady breathing. The next thing is to turn his wrist.

Using the ground for grip he manages to rotate his arm enough that it displaces his sleeve, pulling it back enough that he can see the chain links of the French identification disc strapped to his wrist. It rips a foolish sigh of relief from his chest.

He lets his thoughts bleed away from his mind, focused on the glint of the early morning sun on the scuffed metal and the solid ground below. Reaches deep within him to chase the familiar tug underneath his ribs. His knees twitch, but his body is beginning to calm, the shaking subsiding. Perhaps he is just growing less aware of it.

He can almost hear Francis’ voice. A shade from the last time he was in the South of France. Long before the war.

It is so early in the morning, still.

He doesn’t realise that he is falling asleep until he wakes some hours later. The sun has moved closer to the zenith, barely diffused by the thin canopy above him.

Getting on his hands and knees is an arduous process. Arthur keeps his head low to keep himself from getting head rush but even so he needs to pace himself.

There is a gas cape beneath him. He can’t remember if Gilbert had been wearing his when he left. He doesn’t chase the images away from his mind when they come to him-- their men wrapped in gas capes to hold them together long enough to be transported to a burial trench. A littering of zinc buttons trailing behind them, feet bare.

He does not know how Gilbert managed to spot him-- or what prompted him to carry him away in the middle of the night. Whether it was for Francis, ultimately-- Francis’ tag around his wrist. If Gilbert simply could not have stomached to watch him buried alive.

He closes his eyes and takes three deep breaths before he risks straightening up to kneel upright. Opens his eyes cautiously to test his balance.

The woods are quiet around him.

Arthur takes his time pulling on Gilbert’s shitty boots. Double ties the laces- has to wrap them once around his ankles to secure them properly. He is keenly aware of the fact that he will have to make the trek unarmed and likely with little hope for cover once he crosses the tree line.

On second inspection, the cape Gilbert left him with looks remarkably clean. It’s unlikely that it’s the same cape he had been wrapped with on the cart based on the amount of blood and dried mud on his clothes. How thoughtful of Prussia to lay him on his cape and spare him a wet back.

Maybe it is his odd way of thanking him for the boots.

Arthur allows himself one last moment to sense pull towards his men, the weight of Francis’ name around his wrist, and takes the first step forward.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please leave a comment and tell me your thoughts.
> 
> British/Commonwealth boots were a sought after item, particularly towards the end of the war. 
> 
> If you'd like to read some more about Albert Thielecke, the man who inspired the soldier in this fic, I'd highly recommend having a look at Fraser & Brown's 'Mud, Blood and Missing Men: Excavations at Serre, Somme, France'.


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